Search This Blog

Surprise, surprise

Today was an eventful day. I got permission from the FSW (family support worker) to contact the boys' previous foster mom to pick up their stuff. The FSW had previously said that she would take care of it, but it was taking way too long! I called the old foster mom today. She already had all their stuff packed up, and was just waiting for someone to pick it up! It took like 5 minutes. Ha!

The boys are Sudanese. Apparently in Sudan women don't have much say, and the old foster mom felt that was why the boys were disobedient and that being in a home with a man would be good for them. They are doing so well in our home so far, it's odd to think that their previous placement had problems with them.

I talked to the FSW about the boys' case yesterday. She just kind of gave me some family history and told me a little bit about the boys' mom and the way they used to live. It made me really sad, and again I can't believe how well-behaved they are for all they've been through.

The old foster mom gave me the boys' "Home files" which is just a file that the foster parent has that has a bunch of information in it. It's supposed to have stuff about their behaviours, therapy, history, etc. And...guess what? Our have NOTHING other than the boys names, their parents names, and their placement history. There are 10 sections, neatly marked and indexed and matching a table of contents, filled with blank papers. Awesome! And it turns out that they have been in and out of foster care since 2006???? So that was kind of a surprise too.

Y asked me today what "adoption" was, and we talked about that a little bit. He asked if a kid was adopted, does that mean he doesn't get to see his mom anymore? I said that an adopted child might still see their mom, but they wouldn't live with her anymore. He asked why a child would need to be adopted, and I told him that sometimes a parent can't take care of their kids anymore, so it's best for the child to be in a home where he can get taken care of. He abruptly changed the subject.

C also asked Brian the other day if they were going to stay with us forever. The answer, for now, is that they are just going to stay with us until their mom gets better. I wonder what they think when we tell them that, considering they've already gone back to their mom once and got taken away again.

It just breaks my heart. :(

The FSW doesn't know anything about when the next court date is, and doesn't know if the Foster Care Review Board is reviewing their case or not. Thankfully since I am on an FCRB, I have people I can contact to find this information out! Foster parents are supposed to get notices about these things, but since we are not licensed with the state yet I'm not sure if we would get notices sent to us or not.

The FCRB is a board that meets that reviews cases of kids in foster care to make sure the cases are progressing, and that the kids and the parents are getting all the services they need (counseling, therapy, etc.). Every kid is supposed to get their case reviewed by an FCRB every 6 months, but their aren't enough review specialists (the people paid to research cases and facilitate the board meetings). There are 5,000 kids in foster care, and 4 review specialists...you do the math! It's impossible. But I sent an email to one of the specialists to see if they could review the case if it isn't being reviewed already. Obviously I would not be on the board that looked at the case, but as a foster parent I can go and talk to the board. The board then makes recommendations to the judge, who can order whatever he wants to get the case to move along. According to the FSW, "this case is a mess" and basically nothing has been done on it at all since November. That is so terrible in my humble opinion.

I feel terribly helpless, but I am going to keep on pushing back at the FSW until I get some answers about my questions. In the meantime, the kids are the ones that suffer. :(

Get link

Facebook

Twitter

Pinterest

Google+

Email

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It's been a year since I last wrote. So much has happened! Way too much to put here, but suffice to say it has been crazy. Our oldest has headed off to boot camp for the Marines, he'll be in the reserves. The other kids are 9, 7, 6, 4, 2.

Maybe I'll have time to catch up on stuff later, though I'm feeling a little weird about posting too much online. It's scary out there in the internets!

I'm writing because our journey in Foster Care Land might not be over, like we sort of thought that it was! Let me explain.

In January 2016 hubby's brother and brother's girlfriend had their son taken into foster care. They didn't tell anyone, and their son was with a foster parent (a stranger, no one in the family) for 3 months until hubby's mom found out. She contacted the state and was able to be the foster parent for the little boy. Brother and his girlfriend got straightened out, and got him back about 9 months later.

So I took the three older boys to get their eyes checked. Cassius already had glasses, but only needed to wear them at school. He kept them in the case in his backpack. A few weeks before the last day of school he said "Mommy, when are you going to fix my glasses?" Ah, well, I guess when you let me know that they are broken, son! They were unsalvageable and by that time it really didn't matter too much anyway. I have no idea how long they were broken before he let me know about them. D lost his glasses, or broke them or...something. He typically looses them within a few weeks of starting the school year. Then since Y will be starting kindergarten this year we got his eyes checked as well. We had an inking he maybe needed some help. Yep, his right eye is 20/100 and his left is 20/400! So he needs to wear glasses all the time. Even with glasses the ophthalmologist said she could only get his vision to 20/30, but obviously that is still much much better.

So I'm sure I mentioned that I sent bio mom a message a few weeks ago just checking in on how she's doing, and I hadn't heard back from her.

Well I finally heard back from her last night. She's in the hospital for her heart and blood pressure, and it's not looking so good. She has struggled with this for a long time, it sounds like it runs in the family. She's still very young, too young to be dealing with this but I guess we don't get to decide what "too young" is. Anyway it sounds like she'll be in the hospital at least for a few more days. And doctors found something else on her liver but aren't sure what it is. She was supposed to find out today but hasn't yet.

She asked me to call her, so I did. She said "You guys are about the only family I have left" meaning people that she actually talks to. :( I was nervous about it because I thought maybe there was a chance of confrontation but it went just fine. She sounded so t…

I am a wife to a wonderful husband, a stay at home mom and homeschool teacher, and a small business owner/employee. Currently living in our home we have 2 dogs, 1 cat, and 5 kids. D is 18 and out on his own, C is 9, Y is 7, Miss M is 6, big surprise Ben (conceived after 5 years of not preventing pregnancy and years after giving up on fertility treatments, then born 11 weeks early) is 4, and our youngest (also a big surprise!) is 2. D, Y and C have been with us since June 2010 and Miss M has been with us since May 2012. Their adoptions were finalized on December 1, 2012 when they left foster care forever!
This blog chronicles our adventures and learning experiences as we endeavor to raise someone else's children (now our own!) to the best of our abilities.